第92章

Here you are, eh!" he cried, determined to be cheerful. "Glad to meet you. Hope there are lots more of you." His hope was realised! A few more steps and he found himself in the heart of a spruce thicket.

"Thank God!" he exclaimed. Then again--"Yes, thank God it is!"

It steadied his heart not a little to remember the picture in his mother's Bible that had so often stirred his youthful imagination of One standing in the fishing boat and bidding the storm be still.

In the spruce thicket he stood some moments to regain his breath and strength.

"Now what next?" he asked himself. Although the thicket broke the force of the wind, something must be done, and quickly. Night was coming on and that meant an even intenser cold. His hands were numb. His hunting jacket was but slight protection against the driving wind and the bitter cold. If he could only light a fire!

A difficult business in this tumultuous whirlwind and snow. He had learned something of this art, however, from his winter's experience.

He began breaking from the spruce trees the dead dry twigs. Oh for some birch bark! Like a forgotten dream it came to him that from the tree top he had seen above the spruce thicket the tops of some white birch trees purpling under the touch of spring.

"Let's see! Those birches must be further to my left," he said, recalling their position. Painfully he forced his way through the scrubby underbrush. His foot struck hard against an obstruction that nearly threw him to the ground. It was a jutting rock.

Peering through the white mass before his eyes, he could make out a great black, looming mass. Eagerly he pushed forward. It was a towering slab of rock. Following it round on the lee side, he suddenly halted with a shout of grateful triumph. A great section had fallen out of the rock, forming a little cave, storm-proof and dry.

"Thank God once more!" he said, and this time with even deeper reverence. "Now for a fire. If I could only get some birch bark."

He placed his rifle in a corner of the cave and went out on his hunt. "By Jove, I must hurry, or my hands will be gone sure."

Looking upwards in the shelter of the rock through the driving snow he saw the bare tops of trees. "Birch, too, as I am alive!" he cried, and plunging through the bushes came upon a clump of white birches.

With fingers that could hardly hold the curling bark he gathered a few bunches and hurried back to the cave. Again he went forth and gathered from the standing trees an armful of dead dry limbs.

"Good!" he cried aloud in triumph. "We're not beaten yet. Now for the fire and supper." He drew forth his steel matchbox with numb and shaking fingers, opened it and stood stricken dumb. There were only three matches in the box. Unreasoning terror seized him.

Three chances for life! He chose a match, struck it, but in his numb and nerveless fingers the match snapped near the head. With a new terror seizing him he took a second match and struck it. The match flared, sputtering. Eagerly he thrust the birch bark at it; too eagerly, alas, for the bark rubbed out the tiny flame. He had one match left! One hope of life! He closed his matchbox. His hands were trembling with the cold and more with nervous fear that shook him in every limb. He could not bring himself to make the last attempt. Up and down the cave and out and in he stamped, beating his hands to bring back the blood and fighting hard to get back his nerve.

"This is all rotten funk!" he cried aloud, raging at himself. "I shall not be beaten."

Summoning all his powers, he once more pulled out his matchbox, rubbed his birch bark fine and, kneeling down, placed it between his knees under the shelter of his hunting jacket. Kneeling there with the matchbox in his hand, there fell upon his spirit a great calm. "Oh, God!" he said quietly and with the conviction in his soul that there was One listening, "help me now." He opened the matchbox, took out the match, struck it carefully and laid it among the birch bark. For one heart-racking moment it flickered unsteadily, then, catching a resinous fibre of the bark, it flared up, shot out a tiny tongue to one of the heavier bunches, caught hold, sputtered, smoked, burst into flame. With the prayer still going in his heart, "God help me now," Cameron fed the flame with bits of bark and tiny twigs, adding more and more till the fire began to leap, dance, and snap, and at length gaining strength it roared its triumph over the grim terror so recently threatened.

For the present at least the blizzard was beaten.

"Now God be thanked for that," said Cameron. "For it was past my doing."